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Survivor Millennials vs. Gen X Episode 4 Recap, Edgic and Analysis

Well after a slow start to Survivor Millennials vs. Gen X the season finally looks ready to take off with an incredibly entertaining episode. Lucy’s elimination this week was pretty much a foregone conclusion from the very first preview of last week, but how we got there was far more entertaining than anyone could have ever anticipated. Let’s get right into the episode.

In what became a major theme in the episode, Chris and Bret were immediately out for revenge the moment they got back from camp.

The Role of Revenge in Survivor

Following tribal council, Chris in particular had no interest in hearing what Jessica had to say and when Lucy developed a plan the next morning to send Jessica home, Chris and Bret were quickly on board. Lucy’s decision to try and vote out Jessica was a strange one. For the previous vote, she had voluntarily voted with Jessica without Jessica asserting any dominance at all. If Lucy had thought she was too dangerous than why would she vote with her against Paul at the last vote. Nonetheless, this was the plan that the Gen X tribe were running with and sticking too from early on, but not everyone was happy about it. When Ken and David were told by Lucy that they had to vote for Jessica and weren’t allowed to talk to anyone about it, Ken was clearly taken aback. Due to Lucy being a dictator and trying to tell Ken what to do, the male model immediately turned his back on Lucy and tried to get revenge on her by getting the tribe to vote her out instead. He pulls Jessica aside and tries to warn her that her name is being written down, but instead of listening, Jessica runs straight back to Lucy and tries to confirm that Cece is the one going home. Lucy does an excellent job in this particular instance of getting Jessica to trust her and on convincing her that the vote is indeed going Cece’s way. But now Ken has got a dilemma. Now Jessica has broken Ken’s trust as well and now Ken is on another revenge hunt, looking to go with the majority for the vote and take out Jessica. Luckily for the viewers, David had other things on his mind and decided to save Jessica at tribal council with his immunity idol and send Lucy home. Although this was probably the wrong move for David to make the worst bit of strategy that was occurring throughout the episode was coming from Lucy Huang who somehow thought that trying to assert dominance and be in control (like she does in her home life) would be of use to her in the game of Survivor.

The Worst Strategy in Survivor – Being The Dictator

John Carroll from Survivor Marquesas

You would think that it would be far too obvious to even mention that trying to dictate voting policies in Survivor does not work but here we our in the 33rd season of Survivor and somehow, someone cast on this show still thinks that it is a plausible voting strategy. The notion that being that dictator in Survivor never works was something that we learned back in Survivor Marquesas when John Carroll was quickly dispatched after the merge. Ever since then, every single person who has tried to dictate voting policies without trying to give people a choice has gone home almost immediately afterward, from early contestants like Survivor the Amazon’s Roger Sexton, to more recent examples of Cambodia’s Andrew Savage and Kaoh Rong’s Scott Pollard. Immediately as soon as these characters tried to dictate voting policies they were sent home and the exact same thing happened to Lucy.

It’s not as if you get ever convince people to go along with your way of thinking in Survivor, you just have to be more democratic about it and convince them why it is a good move for them to make rather than telling them “you vote for this person and don’t talk to anyone else about it”. I was flabbergasted that Lucy could be this bad of a Survivor player that she would flat out tell two other people that they couldn’t talk to anyone else about the vote and had to vote for Jessica no questions asked. Although she would have been guaranteed to go home within the next few episodes for her ridiculous approach to the game it must be said that her plan would have actually worked had David not played his idol to save Jessica.

David’s Idol Play – The Right or Wrong Move?

Considering David and his closest allies weren’t ever in danger of going home this episode, playing the idol might not have actually been the best move for him. Either way they were going to be losing someone in a powerful position and were still going to be on the bottom of the tribe the next day. It makes no sense to me why he thought that voting out Lucy instead of Jessica would somehow put him on the top of the pyramid when only he, and Cece actually voted for Lucy to go home. Even if this move secures Jessica’s loyalty and she is able to pull in Sunday as well, every Survivor player should no by now that Episode 5, or after four people have been sent home, is when the first swap of the game is going to occur. So tomorrow, David might not even be with Jessica and might need that idol to save himself even more.

David didn’t need the idol but getting rid of it might not be a bad thing for him either as it should do enough to decrease the target on his back given the upcoming swap. For the time being though, playing the idol was definitely the wrong move for David to make in that moment as he was never in danger of going home and playing the idol likely would not have changed his position in the game had the tribes stayed together next episode.

What About The Millennials?

Although the Millennials weren’t featured heavily in this episode, there was one delightful moment from Adam Klein (not pictured anywhere above) that made him standout above any other character in a positive manner tonight. Well everyone was out goat hunting (Did they give up? Because they definitely didn’t return with a goat?) Adam was intelligently using that time to look for the hidden immunity idol. While everyone else was away he managed to find the clue to the idol but didn’t have enough time to find the idol itself. So after the reward challenge he stepped aside again to “get the sand out of shoes” and immediately went on the hunt for the idol. Instantly after finding it (and after Hannah nearly busted him) he broke down and started talking about his mom who has stage four lung cancer. It’s incredibly courageous of him that he went out on Survivor and I would think that he would only go out there if he was sure his mom was going to be okay but that’s seemingly a big risk to take. Nonetheless, Adam impressively found the idol and gave a very inspirational confessional about how he wants to bring some joy to her by being on Survivor.

Going into the swap, I don’t think that Adam is the type of player who will need the idol to survive. But if he can keep it a secret he is certainly savvy enough to play it at the right time and use it as a tool to make a massive move in the game.

Confessional Count – Episode 4

CASTAWAY

CONFESSIONALS

TONE

RUNNING TOTAL

David Wright

4

Positive

18

Chris Hammons

4

–

11

Adam Klein

4

Positive

11

Jessica Lewis

2

–

6

Lucy Huang

2

Negative

2

Ken McNickle

2

–

6

Zeke Smith

1

–

9

Michaela Bradshaw

1

–

8

Jay Starett

1

–

6

Bret LaBelle

1

–

3

Jessica “Figgy”

0

–

7

Taylor Lee Stocker

0

–

6

Hannah Shapiro

0

–

4

Sunday Burquest

0

–

4

Cece Taylor

0

–

3

Will Wahl

0

DNS

3

Michele Schubert

0

DNS

3

There is no stopping David Wright at the moment and he is pretty much written on as our confessional leader for the season. Chris Hammons and Adam Kleina are quite some distance behind in second, while Zeke Smith and Michaela Bradshaw remain towards the top of the running total despite barely appearing from a confessional standpoint in the last two episodes.

Edgic – Episode 4

What is Edgic? Check out This Premiere Recap to find out. Here is my Edgic chart for Episode 4!

Adam Klein received a tremendously positive edit this episode with all the talk about his mom and how he wants to bring joy to her, while Michaela also received a positive edit for her efforts in the reward challenge. David continues to be our confessional leader and main protagonist and with good reason too as he was the sole reason why Lucy was sent home.

The Winner’s Edit – Episode 4

Although Adam had an incredibly positive performance this episode and stood out above everyone else as a contender to win, I believe that the winner’s edit still suggests that Ken McNickle will win this season. There was no particular standout evidence in this episode to suggest that he could be the winner nor that he is even a particularly good player but from what we’ve seen up until this point I think it still looks like a pretty safe bet

Chris has re-emerged as a contender in large part due to his visibility being off the charts, while David, Michaela and even Jay may be contenders as well. Although it is much more difficult to pick a winner this season than seasons past I am still confident in saying that Ken has the winner’s edit.

Predictions For Next Time

Next episode the swap occurs and although the preview didn’t give any indication on who could go home, it did give us a look into the possibility of Taylor and Figgy being split up. Thus I predict that next week, not only are they split up from each other but that one of them gets split up from their other allies in Jay and Michele too. Given that we saw Taylor making a deal with David in the last episode at the summit and his reasonable strength in challenges, I am going to predict that Figgy is the one out of the two of them that gets sent home next week.

Who Will Be Voted Out Next Time? – Figgy
Who Has The Winner’s Edit? – Ken

Concluding Thoughts

After a bit of a slow start to Survivor 33 it is seemingly picking up and the swap brings a host of unpredictability leading into the upcoming episodes. The upcoming swap should also be the time in the game where the majority of the stable alliances and relationships that have the potential to make it to the end will be formed so it will be very intriguing to see who teams up with who. It has been a fun episode and a fun recap and I hope to see you next time!